After suffering a heavy defeat away at Leeds on Monday, Newcastle were aiming to bounce back against the surprisingly unbeaten Hull.
That aim came with a caveat, however, as the Toon had not defeated the Tigers at home in the PL (D1, L2).
Any early nerves were quickly dashed though, as the home side got off to a rapid start and took the lead after Harvey Barnes played a neat pass to Joe Willock inside the box and the midfielder took a touch before powering in at the near post.
Matthias Jaissle’s men were rampant in the early moments and doubled their lead in the seventh minute with Barnes involved again.
Collecting the ball on the half-way line, the winger drove into the heart of the Hull defence before slotting in Lewis Hall, whose low drive into the far corner had St James’ Park bouncing.
The Tigers were almost gifted an equaliser back into the contest on the quarter-hour after Lukáš Horníček passed straight to Mohamed Belloumi, but the Algerian didn’t react fast enough to capitalise.
The visitors managed to halt the momentum of the Magpies as the half progressed but struggled to test Hornicek, and things almost went from bad to worse on the verge of half-time when Sorba Thomas was penalised after he slipped and grabbed Jacob Murphy’s which tripped the Newcastle man, resulting in a penalty.
Yoane Wissa took responsibility from 12 yards but saw his spot-kick saved by Konstantinos Tzolakis, keeping Hull’s deficit at two going into the interval.
Sergej Jakirovic made a change ahead of the restart in an attempt to shake things up and another on the hour mark which paid dividends.
Belloumi brilliantly slipped in Mohamed-Ali Cho and he powered in off the left post to cut the deficit on 67’, less than five minutes after his introduction.
That goal threw wind in the sails for Hull who came close to drawing level but Hornicek did well to preserve Newcastle’s lead, saving from Belloumi before Tim Iroegbunam had an effort loop over the bar.
In the end, the Magpies did enough to see out the victory and claim an important three points heading into the international break, with both sides sitting on eight points from five PL games, more than most pre-season predictors would’ve imagined.
Defeat will be disappointing for the Tigers as they missed out on becoming the first newly-promoted PL side to avoid defeat in their first five games since Portsmouth in 2003/04.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Harvey Barnes (Newcastle United)